I have not lived in the world so long as I have done, and seen so much of it, without realising how small a world, after all, it really is, and how full it is of coincidence; but I do think that this beats all the coincidences of which I ever heard.
To think that I should have pitched on the one street in London which Mr. Thomas Tennant has chosen for a residence! It seems that I have. I lay awake for an hour trying to account for his sudden appearance from that cab. At last I hit on something. I sat up in bed with quite a jump.
"Can it be possible that he lives in this street?"
Rest was out of the question till I had made sure. I got out of bed--it was nearer five than four--and I tiptoed my way downstairs. I routed out a directory, and I hunted up the street. Sure enough he did. There was his name, as large as life--"Thomas Tennant." He lived at No. 29. My house was blank--it had been empty at the time the directory had gone to press--but I had taken No. 39.
"Well, this beats everything! To think that I have spent all this money, and come all this way, to plant myself five doors from Mr. Tennant!"
He might be unwilling to have me for a neighbour, but I could assure him that I was equally unwilling to have him. I did not wish the first entry on the fresh leaf which I had turned to be a reminiscence, and especially a reminiscence of that particular friend.
I thought that was strange enough, but stranger things were yet to follow. What a queer little world this is!
Recognising that it was no use addling my brains by puzzling out conundrums at that time of the morning, so soon as, by reading it over and over again in the directory, I had made quite sure that my eyes had not misled me, and that Tommy did reside five doors away, I toddled up to bed again. "There is nothing like leather," says the proverb. I say there is nothing like sleep. Give me plenty of sleep and I am good for anything. As I have always been blessed with a clear conscience--if there is a vacuum where the conscience ought to be it must be clear--and, what is equally to be desired, a good digestion, I have ever found sleep come at my bidding. Once I have my toes well down between the sheets, my head on the pillow, and the blankets well up to my ears, I snooze. I know I did just then. And I never dreamed; none of Jack Haines's lively visions came my way.
I looked at my watch when I awoke. It was past eleven. I just turned over. I had a stretch. I believe that, when you wake in the morning, it does you good to have a stretch; it seems to help you to realise that there is a piece of you between your head and your heels. "What should I do?"
"I'll have some tea."